Chapter Eleven
CHAPTER
ELEVEN
The following week, Beth was in the kitchen with Ellie, helping to prepare dinner. After almost two months, Ellie had finally convinced her that she preferred the company and wasn’t just extending the invitation to be nice, so Beth had given up dining alone in her room each night.
‘Right, now cover it and let it simmer.’
‘Yes, ma’am.’ Beth placed the glass lid on the pot of bolognese sauce and immediately set about cleaning the kitchen.
Ellie draped fresh pasta noodles over the drying rack that sat on the bench and sighed dramatically.
‘How have I survived this long without a sous chef? Life is so much easier when you have someone to order around.’ She looked at Beth, narrowing her eyes like an evil mastermind.
‘You should quit your job at the cafe and come work for me. I can only offer you a quarter of what Marge pays you, but I guarantee you’ll have more fun. ’
‘I’m sure that’s true. I mean, how could I not? At the cafe, I have to work autonomously, which is so depressing. Here, I’m micromanaged to the point that I don’t even need to think for myself. It’s such a hoot!’
Ellie flung a freshly cut noodle across the counter and Beth huffed indignantly.
‘Marge doesn’t throw Italian cuisine at me.’
‘Maybe that’s only because she doesn’t know the real you yet, the one with the whip-smart tongue who’s not afraid to say how she really feels.’
Beth snorted, though happiness radiated through her, its warmth spreading from her chest to her extremities.
Ever since their chat at barefoot bowls, after Ellie had seen the impact that Beth’s anxiety had on her life, Beth had felt more confident and more like herself whenever she was with Ellie.
The two of them teased each other in the way that was common among friends.
Her thoughts went to Noah and the way they’d flirted that day at her aunt’s house. Bizarrely, she felt comfortable around him now, too.
Just then, as if her brief reflection had summoned him, he appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, a wide grin on his face and a folder tucked under one arm. ‘Who’s not afraid to say how she really feels?’
‘Beth.’ Ellie picked up the glass of wine she’d just poured and took a sip.
‘Oh. Yeah, already knew that.’ He winked at Beth.
She poked her tongue out at him but couldn’t help blushing, and when she caught Ellie grinning slyly at her from over the rim of her wine glass, the heat in her cheeks increased tenfold.
Noah whacked the folder he’d brought with him on the bench and slapped a hand on top of it. ‘Brought some preliminary sketches of the changes we discussed.’
She sucked in a breath, her embarrassment vanishing. ‘Of the house? Can I look?’ Then, remembering that she was helping with dinner, she threw a cursory glance at Ellie.
‘Oh, don’t let me stop you. Go!’ Ellie shooed them out of the kitchen.
‘Smells great, Elle,’ Noah called over his shoulder. ‘Is there enough for me?’
‘You know there is.’
Noah plonked himself down at the end of the dining table and pushed out the chair on the adjacent corner with his foot. Grinning, he tipped it onto its back legs, indicating that she should sit. ‘Let’s do this, huh?’
‘Yep, let’s do it.’ She sat in the chair, scooting closer as she vibrated with excited energy. After spending the last few weeks daydreaming about the changes he’d suggested, she was finally about to see what they looked like on paper.
He placed a hand on top of the folder. ‘Keep in mind, these are just preliminary drawings to give you a rough idea of what’s possible. We’ll need an architect to draw them up properly, so this is your chance to say what you like, what you don’t like, what you want to change.’
‘Okay, I think I can manage that.’
‘Because of your whip-smart tongue?’ he said and winked.
She grinned. ‘You know it.’
He laughed, then cleared his throat. ‘Right, here we go.’ Flipping the folder open, he removed the drawings and laid them out on the table in front of them.
Beth glanced sideways at him. Was it just her imagination or did he seem nervous all of a sudden?
She looked down at the plans and frowned. ‘I thought you said you sketched these?’
‘I did.’
‘But …’ Every line was so straight, every angle perfect. ‘Noah, sketches are rough, hand-drawn diagrams, not … this! They look like they were drawn by a professional.’
‘Nope, just me.’ He watched her closely and she realised he was nervous—nervous about how she’d react to his ideas.
She looked down at the plans again and took in the details.
Alongside the kitchen was a dining nook complete with bench seating on two sides and the main bedroom’s ensuite had an enormous walk-in shower.
Her mouth dropped open when she saw he’d labelled the front room as the ‘library’ and had added built-in bookshelves spanning the length of the far wall, either side of the fireplace.
She stared at him, gobsmacked. How had he known she’d kill to have a home library?
‘This is …’ She shook her head and examined the plans again. ‘Noah, this is perfect.’
He sat on the edge of his seat. Literally. ‘You think so?’
It was strange to see him so uncertain. From the moment they’d met, he’d oozed confidence, yet here he was, doubting his ability to impress her.
‘Yes,’ she assured him.
Her tone was convincing enough to light a pleased spark in his eyes and, eagerly, he moved the floorplan aside and showed her another sheet, this one with various 3D perspectives.
One caught her eye. It was an impression of the deck from the point of view of someone standing inside the house, but he’d added non-architectural details using coloured pencils.
The gabled roof over the deck revealed the blue sky above, the grass in the field below appeared to sway, and between the trees in the distance, she glimpsed the river.
It was just as he’d described it to her that day; his vision come to life.
She shook her head, in complete awe. If Noah could execute this renovation just as he’d laid out here, then he’d have built her dream home.
She definitely wasn’t paying him enough.
Despite his initial toe-curling insistence that he wouldn’t be compensated for his services, they’d eventually reached a compromise.
Noah had agreed to accept payment but at a ridiculously low rate.
They would absolutely have to review that agreement at some point.
It dawned on her, too, that this would ease some of her guilt.
She’d felt unworthy since receiving news of her inheritance, as if she had no right to claim anything her aunt had left behind.
But by investing some of Prudence’s money back into the house she’d lived in, Beth would, in a way, be honouring her.
Showing gratitude for the gifts she’d been given.
‘What is it?’ He leaned forward, clearly trying to ascertain the cause of her reaction. ‘See something you don’t like?’
‘Are you kidding?’ She grabbed his sleeve, determined to make him see how much she loved his ideas. ‘Noah, I wasn’t offering an empty platitude just now. These plans are amazing. Honestly. I don’t want you to change a thing. This is exactly how I want you to renovate the house.’
Ellie chose that moment to walk in with an enormous bowl of steaming pasta. ‘I’m sorry. Am I interrupting?’ Her brow arched and she grinned.
Beth rolled her eyes, trying to appear cool, calm and collected, and got up to grab three pasta bowls from the sideboard. ‘Of course not. Your cousin’s just blown me away with his talent, that’s all.’
Ellie smirked at Noah. ‘Is that what the kids are calling it these days?’
Noah coughed and sat back in his chair but thanked Beth when she placed an empty bowl in front of him.
‘Seriously, Elle,’ Beth gushed, pushing the plans across the table. ‘Look at this!’
With a smirk at Noah, Ellie pulled the plans close and studied them, eventually nodding like she was impressed. ‘Gotta admit, cuz, you do know what you’re doing when it comes to renovating houses.’
‘A compliment?’ Noah raised his brows. ‘Wonders will never cease.’
‘Shut up.’ Ellie stood and scooped some pasta into a bowl.
‘I forgot you said you’d renovated a few places,’ Beth said, accepting the bowl from Ellie. ‘Whose houses were they? I’d love to see them.’
‘What a great idea! You should show her, Noah. Give her the grand tour of the last place you renovated.’
Noah gave Ellie a bland look. ‘Do you mind?’
Ellie twirled some pasta around her fork and grinned. ‘Not at all.’
‘The first place I renovated,’ Noah said, ‘was the original homestead on our family property. My grandparents lived in it and my dad grew up in it, but when Gramps and then Gran eventually passed, I wanted to do something to honour their memory, so I got stuck in and gave their place a makeover.’
‘That’s so sweet,’ Beth told him.
He shrugged like it was no big deal, but his motivation for renovating his grandparents’ place echoed the thought she’d had a moment ago—that by investing in the house’s transformation, she’d be honouring the aunt she’d never known.
‘Told ya.’ Ellie winked. ‘Golden child of the Brennan family.’
Noah glared at her. ‘If I had a bread roll right now, I’d throw it at you.’
Ellie feigned indignance. ‘Ungrateful.’
‘Says you,’ Beth piped up. ‘You threw pasta at me not half an hour ago.’
‘I was testing it to see if it was cooked!’
‘It hadn’t even been boiled yet!’
‘Okay, children,’ Noah interrupted, waving both hands in a gesture intended to placate. ‘Eat your dinner.’
Beth ignored the reprimand. ‘And what about your other projects?’
‘Hmm?’
‘You said you’ve renovated a few places. Tell me about the recent one Ellie mentioned.’
Noah threw another baleful look at his cousin. ‘It’s my place, actually. Originally, the house belonged to the neighbouring farm, but when the owner died, we bought the property and the house came with it. I moved in and decided to give the whole renovation thing another go.’
‘You must love it. Renovating, I mean.’
He nodded as if there were a thousand ways he could express just how much, but he kept his answer short. ‘I really do.’
As the evening wore on, Noah and Ellie regaled Beth with stories from their childhood and all the antics they’d got up to out on the Brennans’ farm.
The two of them were hilarious, their banter making them seem more like siblings than cousins and Beth envied them that.
What she wouldn’t give for a connection like theirs.
But as she studied each of them from across the table, she thought that maybe it wasn’t such an impossible dream for her after all.